Were you there?

Friday 28^th March

Read Mark 14:66-68

“While Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant-girls of the high priest came by. ⁶⁷ When she saw Peter warming himself, she looked closely at him.

‘You also were with that Nazarene, Jesus,’ she said.

⁶⁸ But he denied it. ‘I don’t know or understand what you’re talking about,’ he said, and went out into the entrance.” (NIVUK)

Peter swore that even if all others abandoned Jesus he would not. In a sense this was true. Peter was indeed the last disciple to flee. He followed Jesus even into the courtyard. When we read this story do we empathise with Peter or do we judge him for his hollow claims of loyalty?

One senses that Mark’s narrative is not written in a way that we should look down upon Peter or laugh at his foolish boasts. We are meant to feel the enormity of the situation. How can anyone stand up under such intense scrutiny and pressure? If even Peter failed the test and separated himself verbally and physically from His Lord – one whom we are in no doubt that he loved – the challenge facing ‘that Nazarene, Jesus’ is immense. For Jesus is not simply being abandoned by his friends.